Zack Snyder is an Overbearing Jackass, or Why "Watchmen" and "300" Suck

The following is a chat/friendly argument from about an hour ago between myself and Scene-Stealers contributor George Hickman. He started it, the jerk.

5:00 PM george: even though i liked it more than you i could TOTALLY write a 10 things that would have improved Watchmen

5:03 PM me: ha ha ha ha

i can answer that in one:

don’t make the superheroes fucking superhuman!

5:04 PM george: that’s actually more of a minor one

for me

1) the fucking music.

me: its the key to the entire film!!!!!!!!!!!

it can’t be minor

5:05 PM it negated the entire point of the story

don’t get me started man

5:06 PM george: who is superhuman besides doc manhattan? ozymandias was supposed to be physical perfection. and he’s catches the bullet in his teeth in the fricking book anyway

that whole fight is pretty true to the book

Rorschach wasn’t superhuman, they made it a point to show how hurt he got and how much he didn’t care

5:07 PM because he was too psychotic to care

5:08 PM The Comedian was superbuff, but also true to the comic book, and it was insinuated he was on drugs, such as PCP which if Rush Limbaugh is to be believed is a drug that turned Rodney King into a KILLING MACHINE THAT THE LAPD HAD TO STOP.

5:09 PM digression. Even though i think the fights/action was actually pretty true to the book, presenting it in SUCH a stylized fashion DID make it seem more superhuman and less human.

5:10 PM me: exactly

i’m saying it was a total failure from a presentation standpoint

total wrong kind of approach

5:11 PM george: and i don’t think total failure is fair at all. i think it should have been tweaked, but I also thought they did a good job with trying to ground it in some sort of physical reality by showing the blood and the bruises and hear the bones crack and such. People got hurt.

5:12 PM Style won out, but If they had gotten other elements right I wouldn’t have cared because it was satisfying.

5:13 PM me: the blood and the bruises and hearing the bones crack and such was not “physical reality”

The answer to why all of these comic book movies fail is that they use the comic books like storyboards, which of course they aren’t. The outcome this produces is a motion comic and not a movie. Movies have different strengths and weaknesses. To ignore them dooms the project to failure.

The answer to why all of these comic book movies fail is that they use the comic books like storyboards, which of course they aren’t. The outcome this produces is a motion comic and not a movie. Movies have different strengths and weaknesses. To ignore them dooms the project to failure.

The answer to why all of these comic book movies fail is that they use the comic books like storyboards, which of course they aren’t. The outcome this produces is a motion comic and not a movie. Movies have different strengths and weaknesses. To ignore them dooms the project to failure.

Agreed on the concept, but I think the key is in the execution, and Sin City had a kinetic quality that made it very cinematic. Plus the dialogue, acting style, and visual style all served a common purpose rather than fighting each other as they do in “Watchmen.”

Agreed on the concept, but I think the key is in the execution, and Sin City had a kinetic quality that made it very cinematic. Plus the dialogue, acting style, and visual style all served a common purpose rather than fighting each other as they do in “Watchmen.”

Agreed on the concept, but I think the key is in the execution, and Sin City had a kinetic quality that made it very cinematic. Plus the dialogue, acting style, and visual style all served a common purpose rather than fighting each other as they do in “Watchmen.”

I’m with George on “300.” But with “Watchmen” I lean more in your direction. Style won out, but one of the main points of the book was to take away the slickness and style and present these characters in flawed, true, real ways. And while it may be true to the book, what works on the page in ink does not always work on the screen in flesh and blood. Oh, and Zack Snyder is pretty damn awesome. “Dawn of the Dead” and “300” are both great flicks.

I’m with George on “300.” But with “Watchmen” I lean more in your direction. Style won out, but one of the main points of the book was to take away the slickness and style and present these characters in flawed, true, real ways. And while it may be true to the book, what works on the page in ink does not always work on the screen in flesh and blood. Oh, and Zack Snyder is pretty damn awesome. “Dawn of the Dead” and “300” are both great flicks.

I’m with George on “300.” But with “Watchmen” I lean more in your direction. Style won out, but one of the main points of the book was to take away the slickness and style and present these characters in flawed, true, real ways. And while it may be true to the book, what works on the page in ink does not always work on the screen in flesh and blood. Oh, and Zack Snyder is pretty damn awesome. “Dawn of the Dead” and “300” are both great flicks.

Don’t forget the Dead Alive zombie baby! And really should write that top ten about “Watchmen” because I do have a lot to say about it and how much of a missed opportunity it was, while also being an enjoyable flick regardless.

Don’t forget the Dead Alive zombie baby! And really should write that top ten about “Watchmen” because I do have a lot to say about it and how much of a missed opportunity it was, while also being an enjoyable flick regardless.

Don’t forget the Dead Alive zombie baby! And really should write that top ten about “Watchmen” because I do have a lot to say about it and how much of a missed opportunity it was, while also being an enjoyable flick regardless.

300 …lbs of crap. The violence was beyond Shoot ’em Up parody. It was a film built on the premise of eight years of George W. Bush-style cowboy diplomacy (with an appropriately imbalanced view of the enemy no less). I might have been able to laugh at it at the end of Clinton’s term, but not W., and I don’t think they were going for laughter to … See Morebegin with. That much self-righteousness literally had me rooting for the Persians. Not after the fact but during the movie — I literally cheered for them during the film.

Watchmen was good, but slow. In a long graphic novel, you expect it. Was never meant to be a film and never should have become one. Again, against the creator’s wishes. To say nothing of the fact that the film sidestepped the media-commenting-on-itself format, which the film was fundamentally incapable of doing. It couldn’t even reference it from a distance.

Sin City worked well for the internally-serialized format. Would have failed (will fail) as a franchise. A good one-off and that’s that. Which leads us to…

The Spirit was a crap book that became a crap film. Never should have been green-lit.

300 …lbs of crap. The violence was beyond Shoot ’em Up parody. It was a film built on the premise of eight years of George W. Bush-style cowboy diplomacy (with an appropriately imbalanced view of the enemy no less). I might have been able to laugh at it at the end of Clinton’s term, but not W., and I don’t think they were going for laughter to … See Morebegin with. That much self-righteousness literally had me rooting for the Persians. Not after the fact but during the movie — I literally cheered for them during the film.

Watchmen was good, but slow. In a long graphic novel, you expect it. Was never meant to be a film and never should have become one. Again, against the creator’s wishes. To say nothing of the fact that the film sidestepped the media-commenting-on-itself format, which the film was fundamentally incapable of doing. It couldn’t even reference it from a distance.

Sin City worked well for the internally-serialized format. Would have failed (will fail) as a franchise. A good one-off and that’s that. Which leads us to…

The Spirit was a crap book that became a crap film. Never should have been green-lit.

300 …lbs of crap. The violence was beyond Shoot ’em Up parody. It was a film built on the premise of eight years of George W. Bush-style cowboy diplomacy (with an appropriately imbalanced view of the enemy no less). I might have been able to laugh at it at the end of Clinton’s term, but not W., and I don’t think they were going for laughter to … See Morebegin with. That much self-righteousness literally had me rooting for the Persians. Not after the fact but during the movie — I literally cheered for them during the film.

Watchmen was good, but slow. In a long graphic novel, you expect it. Was never meant to be a film and never should have become one. Again, against the creator’s wishes. To say nothing of the fact that the film sidestepped the media-commenting-on-itself format, which the film was fundamentally incapable of doing. It couldn’t even reference it from a distance.

Sin City worked well for the internally-serialized format. Would have failed (will fail) as a franchise. A good one-off and that’s that. Which leads us to…

The Spirit was a crap book that became a crap film. Never should have been green-lit.

I think “Watchmen” attempted to go the meta commenting on media route by referencing superhero movies, but it just wasn’t sharp or strong enough. If anything, I thought it actually wasn’t slow enough. They cut out all the sidestories and details that filled the world of the novel up, leaving just the basic murder mystery plot. So a lot of the … See Moreparallel stories/commentary/symbolism was lost. What you got was just a slightly more adult superhero movie, as opposed to the social opus that it should have been. I enjoyed it in the moment, but the more I thought about the movie afterwards, the less I liked it. It ultimately wasn’t terrible, but it was a HUGE missed opportunity.

And Dead Alive had one of the greatest lines ever: “I kick ass for the lord!”

I think “Watchmen” attempted to go the meta commenting on media route by referencing superhero movies, but it just wasn’t sharp or strong enough. If anything, I thought it actually wasn’t slow enough. They cut out all the sidestories and details that filled the world of the novel up, leaving just the basic murder mystery plot. So a lot of the … See Moreparallel stories/commentary/symbolism was lost. What you got was just a slightly more adult superhero movie, as opposed to the social opus that it should have been. I enjoyed it in the moment, but the more I thought about the movie afterwards, the less I liked it. It ultimately wasn’t terrible, but it was a HUGE missed opportunity.

And Dead Alive had one of the greatest lines ever: “I kick ass for the lord!”

I think “Watchmen” attempted to go the meta commenting on media route by referencing superhero movies, but it just wasn’t sharp or strong enough. If anything, I thought it actually wasn’t slow enough. They cut out all the sidestories and details that filled the world of the novel up, leaving just the basic murder mystery plot. So a lot of the … See Moreparallel stories/commentary/symbolism was lost. What you got was just a slightly more adult superhero movie, as opposed to the social opus that it should have been. I enjoyed it in the moment, but the more I thought about the movie afterwards, the less I liked it. It ultimately wasn’t terrible, but it was a HUGE missed opportunity.

And Dead Alive had one of the greatest lines ever: “I kick ass for the lord!”